Food loaves come in a variety of shapes (round, square, rectangular, oval, etc.), cross-sections, and lengths. Such loaves are made from various comestibles, such as meat, cheese, etc. Most loaves are provided to an intermediate processor who slices and packages the products in groups for retail.
A variety of machines have been developed to slice such loaves. One such machine is an FX180™ or the FX Plus™ available from Formax, Inc., of Mokena, Ill. The FX180™ and the FX Plus™ machines are high speed food loaf slicing machines that slice one, two, or more food loaves simultaneously using one cyclically driven slicing blade. Independent loaf feed drives are provided so that slices cut from one loaf may vary in thickness from slices cut from the other loaf. The machine includes a slicing station that is enclosed by a housing, except for a limited slicing opening. The slicing blade is disposed in the slicing station and a drive rotates the slicing blade at a predetermined cyclical rate on a cutting path through a slicing range that intersects the food loaves as they are fed into the slicing station.
In the foregoing machine, the food loaf slices are received in groups of predetermined weight on a receiving conveyor that is disposed adjacent the slicing blade. The receiving conveyor receives the slices as they are cut by the slicing blade. In many instances, neatly aligned stacked groups are preferred and, as such, the sliced product is stacked on the receiving conveyor before being transferred from the machine. In other instances, the groups are shingled so that a purchaser can see a part of every slice through a transparent package. In these other instances, conveyor belts of the receiving conveyor are gradually moved during the slicing process to separate the slices.
Conveyor systems are used for a wide range of purposes. One such purpose is the formatting of one or more streams of product so that, for example, the product spacing corresponds to the spacing needed for a subsequent operation. Such conveyor systems are used, for example, to convert one or two output streams of stacked or shingled meat from a slicing machine into the format required by a packaging machine. Depending on the required format, the conveyor must combine two or more separate streams into a single output stream or multiply the streams into a larger number of output streams. Additionally, the conveyor must properly space the product along both the length and the width of the conveyor to ensure compatibility with the packaging machine.
Conventional conveyor systems for changing the number of streams of product usually include a simple flat belt conveyor and a series of fixed curbs or built conveyors which guide the products in the lateral direction of the belt conveyor to merge two streams into one or to multiply the number of streams. Examples of these conventional conveying systems are described in FR-A-2587007 and FR-A-2168967.
Another conveyor system specifically adapted for formatting meat products is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 4,846,336. The '336 patent is purportedly directed to a conveyor system for positioning slices of meat by converting M input streams of product into N output streams of products where M is an integer greater than one and N is an integer not equal to M. The system includes an input conveyor for conveying M input streams and an output conveyor for conveying N output streams. It also includes a multi-element strip conveyor having its upstream input end arranged to receive products from an input stream and having its downstream end arranged to continuously move laterally throughout the formatting process to deposit products from the input stream to form an output stream shifted laterally with respect to the input stream.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,810,149 discloses a conveyor system for accepting one or more streams of product input and converting the one or more streams to a format that is suitable for automatic loading to a subsequent machine, such as a packaging machine.
In order to ensure accurate and reliable packaging it is advantageous that the groups of slices are arranged in a precise pattern or format. As described in U.S. Pat. No. 6,484,615, as food product loaves are sliced by a rotating blade, the slices removed are propelled or thrown with a trajectory to the receiving conveyor below.
The present inventors have recognized that varying temperature and varying firmness of the loaves being cut will affect the trajectory of the slices from the loaves to the receiving conveyor. These parameters can vary throughout the production day. When the resulting trajectory varies, the stack or shingled group will be located at a variable position on the receiving conveyor and will be shifted in position in the packaging format further down the conveyor line. It is difficult to manually compensate for this varying format throughout the production day.
The present inventors have recognized that it would be desirable to provide a mechanism that reliably corrected for misalignment of food products, such as stacks or shingled groups of slices on a conveyor, particularly on a conveyor between a food processing apparatus and a packaging apparatus.